


Phan's Girl

by KytheWolf



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Crushes, Depression, Domestic, F/F, Family, Fluff, Gay, M/M, Parenthood, School, Teen Angst, parent!phan
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-05-23 05:26:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 19,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14927970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KytheWolf/pseuds/KytheWolf
Summary: Adolescence is a difficult time for everyone, and Dan and Phil are struggling to connect with their daughter as she enters this challenging period of her life and begins pushing them away to struggle through her problems alone. Luckily for the little family, Louise knows how to help them find each other again.*currently on hold - please read chapter 14*





	1. Chapter 1

The day two became three was the happiest day of Dan and Phil’s lives. Four hours of sitting in the uncomfortable waiting room at the hospital, four hours of tapping feet and biting nails, anxious pacing and tight hand-holding, was instantly worth it when they were allowed in to see their newborn daughter for the first time. Dan held her first, and as they stood, with one of Phil’s arms around Dan’s shoulders, looking down at her delicate, swaddled frame and sleeping face, they instantly felt a love for her that was so intense it made them feel as though there was nothing else in the world except for the three of them; a little family; the Howell-Lesters.

As Dan passed her over into Phil’s arms, the nurse asked what they wanted to call her, a smile on her face as she watched the gentle expressions on the new fathers’ faces.

“We should call her Susan,” Phil suggested instantly, grinning cheekily at his husband.

Dan rolled his eyes fondly. “We can’t just name everything Susan, Phil,” he said exasperatedly. “This is our daughter; we should call her something different, something unique that stands out.”

“But it works so perfectly,” Phil argued playfully. “Susan Howell-Lester.”

Dan sighed, smiling, unable to resist his husband’s puppy-dog eyes. “Well, fine. But we have to think of something to shorten it to.”

“Sue?” Phil offered, shrugging.

“Hmm…” Dan narrowed his eyes doubtfully. “Sounds a bit formal, don’t you think? What about Susie?”

“Yes!” Phil jumped on the idea, smiling down at the small bundle in his arms. “But we have to spell it with a ‘z’, because that’s how the cool kids do it.”

Dan grinned and rolled his eyes again. “Alright then. Suzie Howell-Lester it is.”

They brought her home in a taxi, holding her in a carry seat between them. The smiles never dipped from either face for the whole journey, and when they got home they carried her through to the room they had been lovingly preparing for her for nine months. As Dan placed the carrier gently on the floor and bent down to unbuckle her, Suzie began to cry, an insistent sobbing that creased her small face and pulled at their hearts.

Dan lifted her carefully from the carrier and held her close, shushing and rocking her gently as he sat down on the small grey sofa. Phil smiled, watching the loving expression on his husband’s face, tears pricking the corners of his bright blue eyes as he pulled out his phone and took a photo. He stepped closer and put a reassuring hand on Dan’s shoulder. He was nervous, they both were, but that was ok, to be expected; they would be fine.

“I’ll go mix up some milk formula; maybe she’s hungry,” Phil murmured.

Dan nodded, smiling as he looked up at the older man. “Ok. I’ll watch her.”

Phil left the room, turning back briefly in the doorway to take one last look at his husband and daughter. _Daughter_. Phil smiled. _They would be fine._

That night, a new post appeared on AmazingPhil’s social medias:

 _Meet our new daughter, Susan ‘Suzie’ Howell-Lester._ Attached was the photo of Dan cuddling her, a tender moment between father and daughter that had remained frozen in time as Phil’s lockscreen ever since; a memory of the two people he loved most in the world.

*

The Phandom had been pre-warned that there would be fewer videos for the first few months while they were busy looking after Suzie, and Dan and Phil had worked hard to make sure there were enough videos pre-recorded to keep up a fairly regular, if scarce, schedule. Videos for their individual channels were easier as one of them could film while the other watched Suzie, but gaming videos required both of their attention, and filming was often interrupted by one or both of them having to get up in response to Suzie’s crying.

They had tried their best to keep up regular livestreams to make up for the lack of proper videos, and the first time they showed her was a big moment for them and their fans. Phil had been doing a livestream about six weeks after they first got her when he was interrupted by the sound of crying. Dan had gone out to the shop for more milk and a few other groceries, so Phil excused himself from the livestream, assuring everyone watching that he would be back in a minute, and went through to Suzie’s room to find her bawling in her cot. Phil picked her up and shushed her gently, rocking her in his arms. After a few minutes, she calmed down and began falling asleep again, but as Phil bent down to put her back in her cot Suzie started sobbing louder, so Phil picked her up again and carried her back into the lounge as she settled against his chest.

They hadn’t been planning to show her in a livestream until she was a few months older, but Phil didn’t want to let anyone down by stopping the livestream early, so he sat down in front of his computer again with Suzie in his arms.

“Sorry about that, everyone,” he apologised, smiling as the chat instantly exploded with ‘OMG SHES SO CUUTE’s and hundreds of gay couple and baby emojis. “This is Suzie, and yes she is cute, isn’t she?” People immediately began bombarding him with questions, which he answered patiently for about ten minutes before he heard the sound of keys in the front door.

“Phil?”

“In the lounge,” Phil called before turning back to the livestream.

Dan came through, dumping the shopping bags in the kitchen on his way, and just stood in the doorway for a moment, smiling at the sight of his husband and daughter cuddling on the sofa in the soft blue glow of Phil’s laptop screen. He took a quick photo on his phone before Phil noticed him standing there and smiled up at him.

“D’you wanna join me for the last five minutes?” Phil asked Dan, shifting over to make room for the younger man.

“If you’re sure,” Dan smiled, coming to sit next to him and saying hello to the chat.

Phil passed Suzie into Dan’s arms and they continued the liveshow. Just before the end, Dan noticed that Suzie had fallen asleep, so he leaned over and muttered to Phil, “I’ll put this one back to bed.”

“Ok,” Phil nodded, smiling at his husband as Dan stood up and said goodbye to the livestream, also waving Suzie’s tiny hand.

“Bye, everyone,” Dan murmured in a high pitched voice, pretending to be Suzie. “Bye, Pa,” he said, turning her towards Phil. Phil smiled and kissed their daughter on the forehead, watching fondly as Dan left the room with her in his arms. When he turned to say goodbye to the chat, everyone was going crazy with feels and commenting how cute they were as a family, and Phil couldn’t help but grin at the warm welcome his and Dan’s daughter had received from their fans.

_They would be fine._

*

As Suzie grew older, it became clear that she was exactly the happy, loving child she had first appeared. She had wavy light-brown hair and deep blue-green eyes, and she rarely went anywhere without a smile; any room she entered was immediately filled with her joyful aura. She was rather tomboyish, and spent a lot of time out in their little garden counting snails and making friends with the neighbour’s cat.

Pretty much since the beginning, Louise had been a heaven-send. She visited them regularly, often bringing Darcy and Pearl with her, and the three girls became good friends, almost like cousins, while Louise gave Dan and Phil invaluable advice and support throughout Suzie’s early years.

Suzie’s first day of school was a tense time for all of them. They drove her across town and led her through the gates of the primary school into the playground where about a hundred children aged between five and eleven were running around and shouting. Suzie hid behind Phil’s legs, holding his hand tightly as she looked around at the other children. After a moment, one of the teachers spotted them and came over to introduce herself, smiling kindly.

“Hello,” she said. “First day?”

“Yes,” Phil answered, looking down at Suzie and gently pulling her out from behind his legs.

“Name?” The teacher asked, pulling out a clipboard with a list of names.

“Susan Howell-Lester,” Dan told her. The teacher scanned down the list and nodded.

“Ah yes.” The teacher smiled again and bent down so that she was at Suzie’s level. “Do you like to be called Susan, or something else?”

Suzie glanced up at Dan and Phil’s encouraging faces before muttering, “Suzie.”

“Alright then, Suzie, do you want to come with me and say hello to some of the other children?”

Suzie shook her head and moved back behind Phil’s legs. Dan smiled as he crouched down and put a gentle hand on her back.

“Come on, sweetie, it’s alright, go with the teacher,” he murmured encouragingly. Suzie looked at him doubtfully before slowly coming out from behind Phil’s legs and taking the backpack he offered her. Phil also crouched down and pulled her into a hug.

“Me and Da will be back to pick you up later, ok sweetie?” he promised. Suzie pulled away and smiled up at him.

“Ok, Pa.”

The teacher smiled, and Suzie followed her towards the other children, turning around to look at her dads again. Dan and Phil waved reassuringly before turning and walking back to the car. As they climbed in, Dan looked back over his shoulder at the school.

“D’you think she’ll be alright?” he asked Phil anxiously.

Phil grinned. “She’ll be fine, Dan, you’re worrying too much.”

Dan looked at him and smiled. “I’m surprised you’re so calm.”

“Yeah, me too,” Phil admitted, and as Dan started the engine he reached across and took the younger man’s hand. “She’ll be fine,” he repeated.

“I know,” Dan smiled. They sat looking into each other’s eyes for a minute before setting off home.

When they picked her up that afternoon, Phil had been right: Suzie had enjoyed her first day, even managing to make a couple of friends. After that, Dan and Phil alternated one or other of them taking her to school and picking her up, and they even made friends with some of the other children’s parents while they waited by the gate.

_They would be fine._

*

When she was eleven, Dan and Phil decided that it was time to expand their little family even more, and for Suzie’s birthday they surprised her with a visit to the puppy section of the local animal shelter, where she picked out a tawny mongrel puppy with pointy ears and deep grey eyes. She named him Nuki, having picked up the name from watching Dan and Phil film their Sims 4 videos, and they set up his bed in her room.

Suzie was generally a very cheerful and friendly little girl, and she loved spending time with Dan and Phil, whether going out for the day or curling up on the sofa in the evenings with pizza and a movie. She asked them for help if something was bothering her, and they gave it willingly. Dan and Phil adored her, but as she left primary school behind and moved on to senior school they began to notice changes in her behaviour: she became less affectionate, less talkative; they now had to ask before she would tell them things, and even then she wouldn’t always tell.

It seemed to Dan and Phil that their happy, loving daughter was slipping away, leaving them with a quiet, distant teenager and no way to reconnect with her.


	2. Chapter 2

“Suzie! C’mon, you’re gonna be late for school!”

“I know, Da, I’m just coming!” Suzie yelled back at Dan as she finished straightening her hair and looked back at the stony-faced girl in the mirror. Perfect. Suzie grabbed her backpack and leather jacket from the bed and shoved her feet into her combat boots before running out of her room, slamming the door behind her.

Phil appeared in the hallway with a plate of toast as she thundered down the stairs to where Dan was waiting impatiently by the front door.

“How many times do I need to tell you to do your laces up before going down stairs?” Phil scolded her. “If you’ve inherited my clumsiness, you’ll end up breaking your neck one day.”

“Thankfully, I’m a bit more co-ordinated than you, Pa,” Suzie replied sassily, grabbing a piece of toast from the plate and allowing him to kiss her on the top of her head, then kissing Nuki goodbye before heading out the door. “C’ya later, Pa!”

“Bye, sweetie!” Phil called, giving Dan a quick kiss before Dan and Suzie climbed into the car and headed off to school.

There was a few minutes’ silence while Suzie tied the laces on her combat boots, resting them on the dashboard as she did so. As she put her feet on the floor and turned her attention to the toast that had been hanging from her teeth while she tied her laces, Dan asked, “Have you got everything?”

“Bit late to be asking that now, isn’t it?” When Dan just gave her a look out of the corner of his eye, Suzie added, “Yeah, I’ve got everything.”

“Did you finish that Geography last night?”

“No, but I can do it at break.”

Dan sighed frustratedly. “Suzie, as hypocritical as this is of me, you need to put a lot more effort into your school work; you can’t just spend all your time on the internet.”

“You’re right, that is hypocritical,” Suzie muttered, turning to look out the window. 

A tense silence filled the car for the rest of the journey. When Dan pulled up outside Suzie’s school, she climbed out with a muttered, “Bye, Da”, swinging her bag over her shoulder as Dan called after her, “See you later, sweetie.”

The door slammed and Dan watched with a sigh as Suzie hurried through the gate to where her friend was waiting. They exchanged a few words, then the two of them disappeared inside and Dan pulled away, frowning as he drove home and thinking about what he could do to help his daughter.

*

Phil was editing their newest gaming video in the office when Dan arrived home. He called out a greeting as Dan came in and sat down on the sofa, picking up his laptop and beginning to scroll absent-mindedly through Tumblr.

“You alright?” Phil asked, turning around to watch the slight frown on his husband’s face.

“Yeah,” Dan murmured. After a moment he stopped browsing and looked up at Phil. “Have you noticed anything different about Suzie?” he asked lightly.

Phil stood up and moved to sit on the sofa beside Dan. “Yeah, I have actually,” he replied. “She definitely seems a lot more… distant, y’know?”

“That’s what I was thinking as well.” Dan frowned, tapping his fingers on his laptop. “Have you tried talking to her?”

“No,” Phil admitted. “Have you?”

“Not really.”

Phil sighed. “D’you think we should?”

“Probably,” Dan answered, still tapping. He paused before continuing, “I’ll ask her when I pick her up this afternoon.”

Phil smiled, reaching out to take the younger man’s hand in his own, stilling the tapping and just holding it supportively.

_They would be fine._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit of a filler chapter, but we should be getting into the more intense stuff soon


	3. Chapter 3

Suzie’s friend Taylor was waiting for her by the door when she got to school. When he spotted her, he called an overly elaborate greeting, grinning widely. Suzie smiled at him and nudged him with her shoulder, leading him inside.

They wandered through to the locker room, chatting about nothing in particular, Taylor’s arm flung across Suzie’s shoulders. There was nothing romantic about the gesture; Taylor was just an open, affectionate guy, and Suzie deeply appreciated his friendship and the fact that he was able to keep it entirely platonic. Taylor had long, scruffy, caramel-coloured hair; bright blue eyes; a tanned complexion and a slightly slobby sense of style, usually choosing to wear loose ripped jeans or shorts and a baggy T-shirt under his normal denim jacket. He was definitely attractive, but Suzie had never had feelings for Taylor – her eyes were on someone else.

While Suzie got her books out of her locker, Taylor leaned against the one next to hers, chatting idly about whatever celebrity drama had happened last night. Once Suzie had got everything, they climbed the stairs to their form room, still chatting as they sat down at their desks.

“Did you do the Geography?” Taylor asked.

Suzie shrugged. “I did most of it,” she admitted, “but I’ve still got the last couple of questions to finish.”

“You can copy mine if you want,” Taylor offered, yawning.

“Thanks,” Suzie grinned. “Can I see it at break?” she added as their teacher walked in. Taylor nodded, grinning back as the teacher told them to settle down and began calling attendance.

*

They went to the library at break, and as they sat down at a table in the corner Taylor pulled out his slightly tattered Geography sheet and slid it over to Suzie, who grinned in thanks and began hurriedly scribbling down the answers.

As Suzie copied his work, Taylor began eating a packet of crisps, leaning back on his chair and watching her.

“Herst’s gonna kick you out if she sees you with that,” Suzie told him as she heard the tell-tale crunching, glancing up to look for the librarian.

“Yeah, probably,” Taylor agreed, putting another one in his mouth. “But do I give a shit? No, I do not.”

Suzie shook her head fondly before looking back down at her homework. Once she had finished, she handed Taylor’s back to him and stood up, nudging him pointedly as Ms Herst, the librarian, appeared around the corner of the bookshelves.

Taylor hid his crisps subtly on his lap under the table and busied himself with putting his homework back in his bag, carefully not looking at the librarian. Suzie smiled innocently at her, and Ms Herst gave her a suspicious stare before moving on to find someone else to shout at.

Taylor breathed a sigh of relief and stood up, tucking his crisps inside his jacket as they made their way to the door. Once they were safely outside, he pulled them out again and put another one in his mouth. “That was close.”

“I thought you didn’t care if she kicked you out?” Suzie asked jokingly.

“I don’t, I was just worried she’d confiscate my crisps.”

Suzie rolled her eyes, a move she’d learned from her Da, and led Taylor towards the Geography classroom just as the bell rang.

They sat down in their usual seats at the back of the Geography classroom and were unpacking their books as the teacher walked in. The lesson started with the normal lack of enthusiasm from the students, and after only ten minutes Suzie and Taylor had resorted to playing hangman in the back of Suzie’s exercise book when the door opened again and another girl walked in.

Suzie looked up, having just been hanged for failing to guess ‘understatement’, and felt her heart jump slightly as she saw who it was.

“You’re late, Holly,” the teacher said, pausing the lesson to make a note on the register before turning back to his PowerPoint on oxbow lakes.

“Sorry, sir.” Holly crossed over to her desk, catching Suzie’s eye and smiling slightly at her as she sat down a couple of rows in front.

Taylor had by now noticed that Suzie wasn’t paying attention to their game, and he glanced at her just in time to watch as her face turned red and she lowered her head to the desk, busying herself with the textbook. He turned to see what she had been looking at, and a slight grin pulled at his mouth as he saw Holly glance back at them before turning back to the front.

“Someone’s got a crush,” he muttered under his breath, lowering his head next to Suzie’s.

“Shut up,” Suzie hissed, still staring at the textbook.

“I’m just saying, you really need to work on your tomato impression,” Taylor teased, nudging her gently with his shoulder. “It’s pretty obvious.”

Suzie answered by punching him lightly in the arm, smiling nevertheless. “Is it really?” she murmured awkwardly after a moment.

“Yes,” Taylor replied definitively, a playful glint in his eyes.

“Taylor, Suzie, stop talking and pay attention.”

“Ugh,” Suzie muttered, resting her chin on her hand and turning her mind back to the lesson, her gaze occasionally drifting to watch the back of Holly’s head.

*

Holly Jordan had short, reddish-brown hair and olive green eyes. She was the kind of person who didn’t particularly give a fuck about being told off, but was nevertheless kind and caring to her friends. She was a bit of a punk, with two or three piercings in each ear and one each in her lip and nose, skull T-shirts, black ripped skinny jeans and a studded leather jacket, and Suzie had had a massive crush on her for about five months now.

It didn’t help that Suzie had also started struggling with depressive thoughts around the same time, so adding a huge crush into the mix had turned her into a complete emotional wreck. She hadn’t tried talking to Dan and Phil because she figured they had a lot going on and didn’t need the extra worry; instead she had tried to hide it under the excuse that it was just adolescence, lies of ‘I’m fine’ dripping from her lips like a leaking faucet.

It had been terrible at first, but it had since got better; Suzie felt like she was able to deal with it on her own without bothering her dads. She had suppressed it, for now, but there was no way of telling when the beast would raise its ugly head again.

Taylor knew. She hadn’t told him, but he’d guessed – noticed the small changes in her behaviour when the mask glitched and showed the true face beneath. She could talk to him, and sometimes she did, but she found it easier to keep it to herself, to not have to worry about finding the words to explain it.

The bell rang to signal the end of the lesson, and there was the usual fumble to leave, with the teacher yelling over their heads to not leave without handing in their homework. Suzie and Taylor wandered over to the Maths classroom, once again sitting down at the back and unpacking their books.

The lesson passed uneventfully, and when the bell went for the start of lunchtime they headed to the canteen and bought their lunches, taking them over to sit at a table in the corner. They ate in silence for a while, then Suzie felt a tap on her foot. She looked up at Taylor, who caught her eye and nodded to something behind her, a small grin on his face. Suzie turned to see Holly entering the canteen with her group of friends, chatting and laughing. Suzie’s heart did a little jump as she watched the beautiful smile on Holly’s face, then went into full internal freak out mode when one of Holly’s friends nudged her and she turned her head to look at Suzie. Suzie blushed and was about to return her gaze to her plate when Holly smiled and gave her a small wave. Suzie’s face felt as hot as magma as she smiled and waved back, and as Holly turned back to her friends Suzie slapped both hands to her forehead and sat staring down at her plate, wondering if there was any way to kill herself with macaroni cheese to escape the embarrassment.

“Shut up,” she told Taylor; she could hear his breathing stutter as he tried not to laugh.

“I’m not saying anything,” Taylor assured her, the amusement in his voice clear as crystal as he took another mouthful of pasta.

“You’re thinking it, though.” Suzie raised her head to look at him, her chin supported by one hand, and sighed. “Oh my god, she must think I’m so weird,” she muttered despairingly.

Taylor was very obviously failing at hiding his smile as he continued shovelling food into his mouth, but as Suzie spoke he glanced up and caught her eye. Seeing the conflicted expression on her face, he set down his fork and reached across the table to put his hand on her shoulder.

“Suz, it’s fine,” he told her. “Everyone gets flustered when they have a crush; it’s not a big deal.” When Suzie just gave him a look, Taylor added, “Even if she does think you’re weird, that’s clearly not putting her off. I mean, she just smiled and waved at you – that’s gotta be good, right?”

He sat back and picked up his fork again, smiling at Suzie as she sighed and grinned at him. “Thanks,” she murmured, picking at her own food.

“No problem.”

After a few moments Suzie made a face and laid her fork across her plate. “I don’t want this, shall we go?”

“Sure.” Taylor picked up his tray and followed Suzie over to the bins. They dumped their plates on the rack then left the canteen, grabbing their bags from the shelves by the door on their way out.


	4. Chapter 4

The rest of the day passed uneventfully, and at 15:30 Suzie said goodbye to Taylor and walked out of the gate towards where Dan was waiting for her in the car.

“Hey, Da,” she said, climbing in and putting her seatbelt on.

“Hi, sweetie. How was your day?” Dan asked as he started the engine and pulled away.

“Uh, alright.” Suzie blushed and ducked her head slightly as they drove past Holly, trying to hide from any more embarrassing eye contact.

Dan noticed her change of tone and frowned slightly, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. “Is everything ok?” he asked after a minute.

“Yeah, fine,” Suzie answered shortly, trying to watch Holly in the wing mirror.

“Are you sure?” Dan pushed. “Has anything happened with anyone, or anything?”

“Da, I’m fine,” Suzie insisted forcefully.

“You don’t sound fine,” Dan muttered.

“I don’t want you fussing about it,” Suzie told him, raising her voice slightly. “It’s nothing, alright? Just _back off_ ; I don’t need the stress of you worrying about me all the time.”

Several minutes of tense silence filled the car. Dan sighed frustratedly through his nose; teeth and lips clenched in an effort to contain his anger and upset. After a while, Dan managed to calm down enough to say, “We _do_ worry, Suzie; it’s part of our job as parents. And, to be honest, we’d worry less if you’d just talk to us.”

Suzie didn’t reply, and Dan made no further attempt to talk to her for the rest of the way home.

When they pulled into the driveway ten minutes later, Suzie was out of the car within seconds, slamming the door behind her and pulling out her key. She didn’t wait for Phil to open the front door; instead she unlocked it herself and rushed in, ignoring Phil’s surprised greeting and storming past him and up the stairs. As Dan came in and shut the door behind him, they heard Suzie’s bedroom door slam, and Phil turned to look at Dan with a surprised and hurt expression on his face.

“What did you say to her, Dan?” he asked, a slight accusing undertone to his voice.

Dan rubbed his face with one hand and shook his head, sighing. “I asked if everything was alright; she said she was fine, but she didn’t sound it, so I asked again, and she got pissy at me and told me to back off, that she doesn’t want us worrying about her, then I got a bit pissy at her and told her we’d worry less if she’d just talk to us, and…” Dan trailed off and breathed heavily through his nose. “In short, I fucked up.”

“Oh, Dan…” Phil heard the upset undertone in his husband’s voice and wrapped his arms around the younger man in a hug, resting his head on Dan’s shoulder and whispering in his ear, “Don’t worry, we’ll figure this out; we just need to find a different way of going about it.” Dan nodded against his chest, pulling his own arms out to hug the older man back, and Phil added, “I’ll try talking to her later, but for now I think she just needs some space.”

Dan nodded again, and after a couple more minutes they pulled apart. Phil smiled at Dan, and Dan gave him a slight smile back before Phil headed back to the office to finish his editing, and Dan wandered into the lounge, flopped down on the sofa next to where Nuki was snoozing and switched on the TV, not really watching but instead thinking what they could do to help Suzie, his fingers absent-mindedly stroking the dog’s fur.

By the time Phil came in to join him about forty minutes later, having finished editing, Dan thought he might have come up with a plan, or at least part of one, and he told Phil so.

“Yeah? What is it?” Phil asked interestedly.

“Well, maybe Suzie would find it easier to talk to someone else rather than us,” Dan explained. “Maybe she doesn’t want to talk to us because, y’know… we’re guys, and she’s a girl.”

Phil nodded slowly. “So who were you thinking?”

“Who d’you think?” Dan asked, slightly sassily. “Who’s a girl that Suzie’s known practically her whole life, and has helped us with her in the past?”

A grin spread across Phil’s face. “Louise?”

“Worth asking, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, alright. You give her a call, then, and I’ll go get started on dinner.”

Before he left, Phil took Dan’s hand and smiled at the younger man, giving silent encouragement that everything would be alright.

Once Phil had gone, Dan pulled out his phone and dialled Louise’s number, his foot tapping anxiously as he waited for her to pick up.

“Louise! Hi, how’re you doing?”

“Hi, Dan. I’m good thanks, how are you? Is everything alright?”

“Uh, well, not exactly…” Dan trailed off as he thought how to describe the problem to Louise.

“What is it? What’s happened?” Louise sounded genuinely worried.

“Well, we’re not really sure,” Dan told her hesitantly. “It’s about Suzie. Like, she’s been a bit distant recently, and whenever we try to talk to her about it, she lashes out at us.”

“And do you want me to try talking to her?” Louise asked after a pause.

Dan rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand. “Yeah, maybe. I was just thinking that she might find it easier to talk to… y’know, a girl.”

“Of course, yeah. Well, I won’t force it if she doesn’t want to, but tell her I’m only a phone call away if she does want to talk.”

“Yeah. Thanks, Lou.”

“No problem. Oh, and, Dan?” she added just before Dan hung up.

“Yeah?”

Louise paused before continuing, her voice calm and reassuring. “It’ll be fine, alright?”

Dan smiled. “Yeah. Thanks again, bye, Lou.”

“Bye, Dan.”

Dan hung up and, feeling like a part of the weight had been lifted from his chest, wandered through to the kitchen where Phil was making stir-fry.

“How’d it go?” the older man asked, glancing at his husband over his shoulder.

Dan nodded, sighing deeply and putting his hands in his pockets. “Yeah, good: Louise said to tell Suzie that she’s only a phone call away if she does want to talk.”

Phil smiled and turned around to hug the younger man, leaving the stir-fry sizzling on the stove. “That’s good; well done for asking. Even if Suzie doesn’t take her up on the offer, at least she can know that she has got that as an option.”

“Yeah,” Dan agreed, hugging Phil back. After a minute, Phil pulled away and handed Dan the spatula.

“Right. You keep an eye on the food; I’ll go tell her it’s nearly ready, and about Louise’s offer.”

Dan nodded and turned his attention to the stir-fry, and Phil left the kitchen.

*

Suzie’s music was cranked up to almost full volume, which meant she nearly didn’t hear when Phil knocked on the door and called, “Suzie? Can I come in?”

Suzie reached over from where she was lying on her bed with her laptop across her legs and turned the music down, calling an unenthusiastic answer of, “Sure, if you want.”

Phil opened the door and stuck his head in as Suzie went back to scrolling through Tumblr. He stood watching her in silence for a moment, then moved over to sit on the edge of the bed. “Can I talk to you?”

Suzie shrugged, glancing at him over the top of her laptop.

“I know you might not want to talk,” Phil began, “and that’s fine. If you don’t want to tell us what’s going on, we’re not gonna push it.”

Suzie looked at him properly this time, then slowly closed her laptop and slid it onto the bed as he continued.

“But, if you decide you want someone else to talk to besides us, Da was just on the phone to Louise, and she said that if you’d rather talk to her, you can just give her a call anytime, ok?”

After a moment, Suzie nodded, a small smile creeping onto her face. “Thanks, Pa.”

Phil smiled at her, putting one hand on her knee comfortingly. “That’s alright. Dinner’s nearly ready, so see you downstairs in about ten minutes?”

Suzie nodded, and Phil left her room. As the door clicked shut behind him, Suzie opened her laptop again and continued scrolling through her Tumblr dash, occasionally pausing to ‘like’ something that caught her eye. She wasn’t the kind of person who went around ‘liking’ every post she saw; she was quite reserved about publicising her opinion (something she had learnt from her dads), but one post in particular made her smile: it was a collection of photos and gifs of Suzie’s appearances in Dan and Phil’s videos or photos on their social medias, and all of them showed a happy, loving girl as part of a family who adored her. At the bottom of the post were the words, “Meet our new daughter, Susan ‘Suzie’ Howell-Lester” and a date – Suzie’s birthday, the day Dan and Phil had brought her home.

As Suzie clicked ‘reblog’, she felt a twinge of guilt at the way she had been pushing her dads away, rejecting their help when they so obviously loved and worried about her. It wasn’t that she didn’t know that; she did – she just didn’t know how to find the right words.


	5. Chapter 5

“Hey, Suz, can I come hang out at yours after school?” Taylor asked at lunch the next day. “My parents are out til late and it gets a bit boring being by myself for ages.”

“Yeah, sure,” Suzie told him, taking a bite of her sandwich. “I think Pa’s picking me up today, and he’s probably less likely to say no.”

Taylor grinned. “Thanks.”

They chatted about nothing in particular as they finished their lunches, then spent the rest of the lunch hour in the library. When the bell went, they headed to Maths, and then Computing. Neither of those classes were ones Suzie shared with Holly, so she was (for the most part) spared from having to deal with Taylor’s teasing comments.

At the end of the day, Suzie led Taylor out of the front gates to where Phil was waiting in the car.

“Hey, Pa. Is it alright if Taylor comes round for a few hours?” she asked as she opened the door and climbed in.

“Hi, Suzie.” Phil smiled. “Yes, that’s fine. Hello, Taylor,” he added as Suzie’s friend climbed into the backseat.

“Hello, Mr Lester.”

“How was your day?” Phil asked once he had pulled away from the pavement.

“Eh, alright,” Suzie answered. “Nothing special, really.”

“Fair enough,” Phil grinned. He didn’t speak much for the rest of the journey home, just letting Suzie and Taylor talk for the most part except to occasionally add his own thoughts to the conversation.

When they got home, Suzie and Taylor retreated upstairs to Suzie’s room, calling quick greetings to Dan on their way up.

“Hello, Suzie,” Dan smiled, coming into the hall when he heard the door, Nuki yapping at his heels. “Hi, Taylor, how’s it going?”

“Good, thanks, Mr Howell,” Taylor replied, following Suzie upstairs.

Once they had disappeared, taking Nuki with them, Phil crossed over to his husband and kissed him. “You alright?” he asked as he pulled away.

“Yeah, fine,” Dan answered, stepping back towards the office. “I’ve got that new game installed, are you ready to record?”

“Yep, ok. You go set everything up, I’ll grab us some drinks and meet you in there in a minute.”

*

“Make yourself at home,” Suzie told Taylor in a jokey impression of being a posh host. Taylor grinned and flopped down on the sofa, reaching out to stroke Nuki as the dog jumped up next to him.

“So,” Taylor said as Suzie closed the door behind them.

“So what?” Suzie asked, sitting down cross-legged on her bed.

“I feel like there’s something we need to talk about,” Taylor told her, his face mock-serious.

“What?” Suzie repeated.

“You and Holly!” Taylor grinned. “What’s the haps? How long have you had a crush on her? And, most importantly, what’re you gonna do about it?”

Suzie rolled her eyes and flopped backwards onto the mattress, sighing loudly.

“C’mon, Suz, tell me,” Taylor whined jokily. When Suzie still said nothing, he added, “I’m gonna keep asking til you tell me, so the sooner you start talking the sooner I’ll stop bugging you.”

Suzie sat up again to see Taylor smiling sweetly at her. A small grin crept onto her face and she sighed again; “Fine.”

“Yay!” Taylor cheered childishly. “So, Question 1: how long have you had a crush on her?”

“About five months,” Suzie replied after a pause.

“What?! And you haven’t done anything about it yet?”

“No,” Suzie answered sheepishly. “But, y’know, I mean, why would she… like, even _like_ me, y’know? What have I got that would even make her like me?”

“Well, you’ve clearly got something,” Taylor told her, “I mean, why else would she be smiling and waving at you?”

“It’s probably just sympathy for the weird girl,” Suzie muttered, flopping backwards again. “She’s probably straight, anyway.”

“You don’t know that, Suz,” Taylor shrugged, glancing down as Nuki jumped down from the sofa and leaped up onto the bed to sniff Suzie’s face. “For all you know, she could be the gayest gay to ever gay and she has a crush on you back.”

“Ha, don’t get my hopes up,” Suzie muttered, pushing Nuki off her and sitting up again. “Gerroff, Nuki.”

A few moments of silence passed as Nuki rested his head in Suzie’s lap, closing his eyes happily as she stroked the soft fur behind his ears. They talked about something else for a while, but after about ten minutes Taylor suddenly frowned.

“Hang on,” he said, “you said you’ve had a crush on Holly for about five months; wasn’t that when your depression started?”

“Yeah.” Suzie glanced up at him. “How the fuck do you remember that?”

“You’re my best friend, Suzie; I care about your mental health,” Taylor explained gently. After another silent pause, he added, “Have you tried telling your dads?”

“No; they’ve got enough on their plates as it is, they don’t need the extra worry,” Suzie told him, nuzzling her face in Nuki’s fur.

“Suz, c’mon; they’re your _parents_ , they’re meant to worry. They might even be able to help, if you talk to them.”

“I’m fine without help,” Suzie muttered. “Besides, if I need to talk, I’ve got you.”

“Of course you have me.” Taylor stood up from the sofa and crossed over to sit on the bed next to Suzie, absent-mindedly stroking Nuki as he continued, “I’m always here if you need me. But they have experience with dealing with mental health problems; I don’t. All I can really offer you is an outlet.”

“Yeah, but that’s enough,” Suzie murmured, not meeting his eyes as she continued stroking the dog.

Taylor smiled sympathetically. “I get that, but you will need to tell them at some point, and it’ll probably be better for you to tell them sooner rather than later.”

“Yeah, ok,” Suzie admitted after a moment. She paused, then held out her arms towards Taylor. Taylor leaned in to hug her, holding her for a few moments despite having to reach awkwardly over Nuki. “Thank you,” Suzie told him, burying her face in his shoulder.

“No problem,” Taylor smiled.

The hug lasted for a few more moments before they were interrupted by a knock at the door and Phil sticking his head in.

“Oh, sorry,” he apologised as Suzie and Taylor hurriedly let go. “Um, will you be staying for dinner, Taylor?”

“Uh, yeah, if that’s alright,” Taylor answered slightly hesitantly.

“Yep, ok. Is takeaway Chinese alright with you?”

“Yeah, that’s fine.”

Phil nodded, then paused as he made to leave, glancing back at them. “Everything alright?”

“Yea, fine,” Suzie told him.

Phil smiled. “Ok. We’re gonna order in about five minutes, so we’ll be eating in about half an hour?”

Suzie and Taylor both nodded, and Phil left. As the door closed behind him, they began talking about Holly again, trying to lighten the mood from the gloom that depression had left.

*

Dan called them down for dinner exactly on time as Phil had predicted. When Suzie and Taylor arrived in the kitchen, Dan was unpacking the food on the counter, and they could hear Phil on the phone in the lounge. They sat down at the table, and as Dan was bringing the food over Phil came in looking slightly annoyed about something.

“Everything alright?” Dan asked him as the older man crossed over to the fridge to get a drink.

“Yeah, but they’ve moved that meeting thing to tomorrow, so we won’t be around to pick you up from school,” Phil answered, directing the last part at Suzie.

Suzie shrugged, already helping herself to prawn crackers. “That’s fine,” she said, putting one in her mouth. “I can just walk.”

“I would offer you to come to mine, but my parents have got guests over,” Taylor apologised as Suzie passed him the container of spring rolls.

“It’s fine,” Suzie repeated.

They settled down to eat, and the topic changed. Suzie and Taylor laughed and chatted easily throughout the meal, and Dan and Phil occasionally made subtle eye contact, exchanging looks that discussed the relationship between their daughter and her friend.

“What?” Suzie asked them as she caught them grinning at each other; Taylor had just made a joke, and Suzie’s response had been a fond smile, nudging him with her shoulder and calling him an idiot, which Dan and Phil thought added some credibility to their theory.

“Nothing,” Phil answered, still grinning. “We were just thinking how much you two remind us of ourselves.”

“Uh…” Suzie glanced at Taylor, who looked momentarily surprised before he smiled and took another bite of food, keeping his eyes on his plate. Suzie looked back at Dan and Phil. “Oh my god, Pa, no! We’re just friends,” she said indignantly. She picked up a spring roll and put it in her mouth before pointing her chopsticks at Dan and Phil. “You two are as bad as your own fans are with you.”

Dan chuckled as Phil held up his hands in mock-surrender. “I’m just saying…”

“We’re just friends!” Suzie repeated insistently when they still didn’t look convinced.

A few moments passed in silence, then the casual chatter started up again. They didn’t mention it again for the rest of the meal, and when they had all finished eating Suzie and Taylor helped clear up before going into the lounge to play Mario Kart.

“D’you think there is something more between them?” Phil asked as he began filling the sink with water to do the washing up.

“I don’t know,” Dan admitted, “but she’s right, isn’t she?”

“About what?”

“That we’re being as bad as our fans. Like, assuming that just because they’re laughing and comfortable with each other that they’re more than just friends.”

“Yeah, I s’pose.”

Meanwhile, Suzie was destroying Taylor at Mario Kart, coming first again and again and leaving Taylor back in fifth, sixth or seventh. They played for almost two hours before Taylor decided he should probably head home.

“D’you want us to drop you back?” Suzie asked as she turned off the Switch.

“Nah, it’s fine, I’ll walk,” Taylor told her, going to the front door and putting his trainers on.

Suzie leaned against the wall and watched him as Taylor picked up his rucksack and opened the door. “Bye, Suz.”

“Bye. See you tomorrow,” Suzie called, moving to close the door behind him, but before she could Taylor turned around and spoke again.

“Listen, Suz,” he said gently. “I know you might not want to, but you probably should tell them about… y’know, those things we talked about. I mean, seriously,” he added, grinning slightly, “you’ve got two dads, one of whom also suffers from depression; do you really think they’ll be anything but supportive?”

Suzie smiled at him and nodded. Taylor grinned back and walked off, waving at her as he reached the end of the driveway. Suzie waved back, calling one last goodbye before closing the door.

As she turned back into the hall, Dan came down the stairs.

“Was that Taylor leaving? Does he want a lift?”

“I offered, but he said no,” Suzie told Dan as she passed him, heading up to her room.

Once there she lay on her bed, browsing Tumblr and thinking about what Taylor had said.


	6. Chapter 6

When Suzie got home on Wednesday, the house was silent. Nuki was asleep on the sofa in the lounge, so Suzie kicked off her boots and went upstairs to dump her bag.

Dan and Phil had dropped her off at school that morning before heading straight off to their meeting. Phil had asked her to text when she got home safely, to which she had rolled her eyes (she was sixteen, after all, and it wasn’t the first time she had walked home alone) but agreed. Now, she carried her laptop downstairs to be with Nuki and flopped down next to him on the sofa, pulling out her phone to text Phil.

Once she’d done that, she put her phone down and left her laptop to turn on as she went through to the kitchen to get a snack. When she came back five minutes later with a buttered crumpet and a mug of tea, there were two text messages waiting for her. One was from Phil, acknowledging that she was home and saying that they would be back between seven and half past; the other was from Louise, saying that she was in the area and wondered if Suzie wanted to meet up to take the dog for a walk and chat.

Suzie hadn’t had much contact with Louise since the latter had moved out of London with her family three years ago. They still visited each other a couple of times a year, but other than that they didn’t talk much. Suzie had Darcy and Pearl’s numbers and social media contacts, but they had drifted apart since they were younger, and the only interaction Suzie had with them was occasionally ‘liking’ their posts.

As Suzie read Louise’s text again, she remembered that Phil had mentioned Dan’s talk with Louise about her, and guessed that was what it was about. Shrugging, Suzie sent a reply confirming that she would like to meet up, and once Louise had texted back to say she’d be there in about fifteen minutes Suzie put her phone down again and began browsing Tumblr on her laptop, planning in her head what she would say when Louise inevitably asked what the problem was.

*

A little over ten minutes later, the doorbell rang. Louise was standing on the step, and she smiled warmly when Suzie opened the door.

“Hello! How are you, Suzie?” she asked, stepping over the threshold and holding out her arms for a hug.

Suzie obliged, murmuring, “Yeah, I’m alright. How’re you?”

“Yeah, good thanks.” Louise pulled away, smiling. She still looked pretty much exactly the same as she had the last time Suzie saw her: blonde hair, green eyes, perfect makeup and happy, round face. “Are you ready to go?” Louise asked.

“Yeah, let me just get the dog and put my shoes on.”

Louise waited in the hall while Suzie pulled on her combat boots and leather jacket and then went to grab Nuki’s lead. The dog jumped up excitedly when he saw her approaching, and once the lead was clipped onto his collar Suzie grabbed her phone and keys and went back out to the hall.

Suzie locked up while Nuki said hello to Louise, then they set off down the street.

“So, how are things with you?” Louise asked, a slight cautious undertone to her voice.

“Fine,” Suzie answered shortly. It wasn’t exactly a lie, but she wasn’t sure how to elaborate. “Did Da and Pa ask you to come round?” she inquired after a moment.

“No, no,” Louise assured her. “I was just in the area, and wondered if you might like to talk. Did they tell you about your Da’s phone call to me?”

“Yeah.”

“That offer still stands,” Louise smiled. “If you don’t want to talk today, that’s fine, I’m not going to force it. I was just wondering if you’d maybe find it easier if I came to you rather than you having to call me.”

“Yeah…”

They didn’t talk much for the rest of the walk to the park. Once they got there, Suzie let Nuki off the lead and watched as he scampered off to chase smells. Suzie and Louise began wandering around the edge, and after a minute Suzie took a breath and asked tentatively, “What exactly did Da say to you, when he called you?”

“Well,” Louise answered carefully, “he said that you’d been a bit distant with them recently, and that you were… reluctant to talk to them about what was wrong. He wondered if you might find it easier to talk to another girl.”

“Mm…” Suzie nodded, “maybe.” She was silent for a moment, thinking, her eyes following Nuki. Then she muttered, “I kinda… have a crush.”

Louise smiled at her. “That’s great! Mind if I ask who?”

“This girl at school…” Suzie trailed of as Louise nodded understandingly.

“Ah, I see.” Louise paused before adding, “You do know your dads will support you no matter what, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I just… don’t know how to bring it up.” As Louise nodded again, Suzie continued, “It’s like, I want them to know, but like… I don’t wanna tell them.”

Louise smiled sympathetically. “These things can be difficult. I’m sure the time will come when you feel ready to tell them. Is she someone you know well?” she added.

“No. I only share a couple of classes with her, and I don’t sit near her in either.”

“Do you ever talk to her?” Louise asked.

“Not really, and that’s a big part of the problem – I can’t just go up to someone I barely speak to and say, ‘hi, you don’t know me but will you go out with me?’” Louise hummed in agreement, and Suzie added, “I also don’t even know if she likes girls like that, y’know?”

“It’s a dilemma,” Louise agreed, sighing. She paused, and then said, “Do you want my advice?”

“Yeah, sure,” Suzie shrugged.

“Just go for it.” When Suzie looked surprised, Louise continued, “I’m not saying ask her out on a _date_ straight away, but talk to her; make friends with her, ask if she want to hang out, and then maybe tell her what you feel. If she doesn’t feel the same, you can still be friends, so you might as well go for it.” Louise paused again. “Look, the reason I say that is, I watched your dads pine for each other for years before they eventually got together; I don’t want to see you go through the same struggle.”

Suzie smiled. “Thanks.”

“Any time,” Louise grinned.

They talked about other things as they made their way around the park, then Louise said she had to go. Before she left, Louise pulled Suzie into a hug and wished her luck, both with telling Dan and Phil, and talking to Holly. She smiled encouragingly as she pulled away, and Suzie thanked her for the chat, then they went their separate ways.

Suzie clipped Nuki’s lead on and headed home. She had decided not to tell Louise about her depression; one hurdle at a time was enough.


	7. Chapter 7

When Dan and Phil arrived home, Suzie was sitting slumped in the sofa crease doing her English homework with her feet on the coffee table, her laptop on her legs and headphones on. Nuki was asleep next to her, but when Dan called a greeting he perked up and went to go say hello to them.

“Hi, Nuki,” Dan smiled, bending down to pet the dog as Phil moved past to put the bag of takeaway fish and chips in the kitchen, calling a greeting to Suzie as he passed the lounge.

Dan led Nuki back into the living room and sat down on the sofa a little way away from Suzie. “You alright?” he asked her.

His daughter pulled off her headphones. “Yeah, fine,” she smiled.

Dan grinned back and stretched. “We stopped off for fish and chips on the way back, that alright with you?”

Suzie nodded, then looked up as Phil came in and flopped down in an armchair. “How was your day, sweetie?” he asked.

“School was alright,” Suzie shrugged, “nothing special. Came home, had a crumpet, then took the dog for a walk with Louise.”

Dan blinked. “Louise came round?”

“Yeah,” Suzie told him. “She was in the area, and wondered if I wanted to talk – y’know, after you called her.”

“And… did you?” Phil asked gently.

“Yeah.”

There was a moment’s silence, then Dan asked casually, “What did you talk about?”

Suzie paused and closed her laptop before turning to face her dads. “I… have a crush.”

Smiles spread across Dan and Phil’s faces as the older man asked, “Who is it?”

“Is it your friend Taylor?” Phil suggested mock-innocently.

“What?! No! Pa, c’mon…” Suzie trailed off as Phil held his hands up in surrender, a cheeky grin on his face. “No, it’s, uh… a girl at school…” Suzie grinned shyly. “Her name’s Holly.”

Dan shuffled closer and pulled her into a hug, kissing her forehead. “Oh, sweetie, we’re so happy for you.”

“Is that why you’ve been not wanting to talk to us?” Phil asked.

“Uh, yeah…” Suzie murmured. “And I’m sorry about that – I was just coming to terms with it, and I didn’t know how to say it.”

“Well, you’ve said it now,” Dan grinned, standing up. “C’mon, let’s go have some dinner before it goes cold and disgusting.”

Suzie put her laptop down and made to follow him, allowing Phil to hug her as well on their way to the kitchen. It wasn’t the whole truth, but at least some of the weight had been lifted from her shoulders.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's so late! I will try to upload more regularly from now on

“So you told them everything?” Taylor asked. He was leaning against the locker next to Suzie’s, and she had just finished telling him about her conversations with Louise and Dan and Phil the previous evening.

“Not quite.” Suzie closed her locker and leaned against it, her arms full of books. “I mean, I told them about… y’know, Holly,” she murmured, lowering her voice, “but I didn’t mention the other thing.”

Taylor shrugged and nodded. “Well, that’s a start at least. Good for you,” he said, smiling kindly.

“Thanks,” Suzie grinned.

“What was Louise’s advice again?” Taylor asked as they began walking along the corridor towards their first lesson.

“Just to go for it,” Suzie told him, glancing sideways and frowning at the smirk on her friend’s face. “What?”

Taylor didn’t speak for a moment; instead he looked forwards and nodded towards something a little way down the corridor. Suzie followed his gaze and blushed, stopping mid-step when she saw what, or rather who, he was looking at.

“Here’s your chance,” Taylor murmured in her ear, smiling.

“Oh, fuck,” Suzie muttered, looking away from where Holly was standing with her group of friends. “What do I say?” she hissed to Taylor.

“I dunno,” he shrugged unhelpfully, “maybe just ask if she wants to hang out sometime?”

“Fuck,” Suzie repeated to herself, her fingers tapping nervously on one of the books in her arms.

“C’mon, it’ll be fine,” Taylor assured her. “Just don’t freak out.”

Suzie took a steadying breath. “Ok,” she muttered as the five-minute bell went, watching as Holly’s friends peeled away leaving Holly standing at her locker alone. “Ok, ok, ok.”

“Quick, before you miss her,” Taylor urged gently.

Suzie nodded and began walking towards Holly, taking a deep breath to steady her nerves. When she was about a metre away she paused and said, slightly shakily, “Hey, Holly.”

Holly turned, a small grin finding its way onto her face when she saw who it was. “Oh, hey, Suzie. What’s up?” she asked, turning back to her locker and pulling one of her textbooks out.

“Uh, nothing much…” Suzie took a quiet breath. “Um, listen Holly, I know we don’t really know each other that well, but, uh, d’you wanna maybe hang out sometime?” As she spoke, Holly had turned around to look at her again, and Suzie gulped nervously as the other girl’s olive green eyes met her own aqua ones.

“Yeah, alright.” Holly grinned again, more widely this time. “When suits you?”

“Oh, um…” Suzie had been so preoccupied with asking _if_ Holly wanted to hang out that she hadn’t given any thought to the _when_ or _where_. “Uh, are you free tonight?” she said hurriedly. “You could come to mine for dinner, if you wanted?” As soon as she finished speaking, Suzie began scolding herself mentally; _was that too forward? What if Holly thought she was desperate?_

“Sounds good,” Holly agreed, still smiling, as she closed her locker. As Suzie grinned with relief, the bell rang and Holly swung her bag onto her shoulder. “Uh, we should probably go to class; I’ll meet you by the gate after school, yeah?”

“Yeah, ok, cool! See you then!” Suzie called as Holly gave her a last grin before heading away down the corridor.

Throughout the exchange, Taylor had been standing on the other side of the corridor on his phone, and as Holly left he looked up and grinned at Suzie. “So, how’d it go?” he asked, his voice full of amusement at the almost drunk-happy expression on Suzie’s face.

“Great,” Suzie grinned. “She’s coming round to mine later.”

“Wow, that was quick.” Still grinning, Taylor began walking down the corridor in the opposite direction to that which Holly had gone. “C’mon, tell me about it in English – we don’t want to piss of the teacher by being too late.”

*

At lunch time, Suzie texted Dan to let him and Phil know that Holly was coming round later.

_Hey da so you know the girl I told you and pa about yesterday?_

_Yh everything ok?_

_Yh fine but I asked if she wanted to come round for dinner later & she said yes so is that ok?_

Dan’s reply was simply “ _fine_ ” followed by a Lenny face.

 _Da no._ Suzie quickly sent another message;  
_That’s exactly why im telling you now instead of later when shes already there  
Please don’t do anything to embarrass me I stg_

_Don’t worry I wont ;)_

_Da srsly_

_I wont I promise ;p_

_Thank you. Cld u tell pa as well_

_Dont have to_  
_He’s reading over my shoulder_  
_[rat emoji]_

_Pa you better not do anything either_

_He says he promises as well ;p_

_Thx da c u later xx_

_Xx_

Suzie sighed with relief as she put her phone away, meeting Taylor’s eye from where he was watching her from across the table.

“All ok?” he asked, grinning at the expression on her face.

“Yeah,” Suzie smiled, excited for the evening now that she knew her dads would behave.

*

At the end of the day, Suzie’s heart did a little skip when she saw that Holly was waiting for her by the gate as they’d agreed; part of her had been afraid that Holly would ditch her. She said goodbye to Taylor and headed down to the gate.

As she got near, Holly glanced up from her phone and grinned. “Hey.”

“Hi,” Suzie said. “Um, have you got everything?”

“Yeah, I’m good. How are we getting to yours?”

“Uh, I think my Da’s picking us up in the car,” Suzie replied, pulling out her phone to check. There was a message from Phil saying that he would be a couple of minutes late, so Suzie sent a quick ‘ _ok_ ’ in reply and then looked back up at Holly. “Um, it’ll be my Pa picking us up, but he said he’ll be a few minutes late.”

“That’s fine,” Holly smiled, watching the flow of students pass them for a moment before turning back to Suzie. “So… um, have you got two dads?” she asked cautiously.

“Yeah,” Suzie told her, slightly hesitantly.

Holly nodded slowly. “Cool,” she said after a moment, grinning at Suzie. Suzie grinned back, and Holly seemed about to say something else, but then changed her mind, instead just nodding again and looking around.

A few minutes later, Suzie glanced down as her phone buzzed to see a text from Phil saying that he was there. She relayed the message to Holly, and the other girl grinned as Suzie led her out of the gate and down the road a little way to where Phil was waiting in the car.

Phil smiled at Suzie as she opened the passenger door. “Hello, sweetie.”

“Hi, Pa.”

“You must be Holly,” Phil added, looking in the rear view mirror as Holly climbed into the backseat.

“Yes,” Holly replied, smiling.

“Do your parents know where you are?” Phil checked. Then, when Suzie gave him a look, he added, “I just want to make sure they’re not going to be worried about you.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Holly assured him. “I texted my mum earlier and she’s ok with it; honestly, she’s probably just glad to have one less person to cook for.”

Phil chuckled as he pulled away from the pavement and onto the road. “Speaking of dinner, is curry alright with you? Or we could get takeaway?”

“I don’t mind, I’m not picky,” Holly answered.

Phil asked Suzie to text Dan and tell him to get started on dinner, and while she did so a couple of moments of silence passed. After a few seconds, Holly asked Phil, “By the way, what should I call you?”

“Erm,” Phil glanced at Suzie, “you can call me ‘Mr Lester’, and call my husband ‘Mr Howell’. That’s probably easiest, isn’t it?”

Suzie nodded in agreement and turned to address Holly, “That’s what Taylor calls them.”

“Ok, cool,” Holly grinned. She nodded slowly and looked out of the window, and a thoughtful expression crossed her face, unseen by either Phil or Suzie, who had turned back to face forwards.

They didn’t speak much for the rest of the way home, as neither Holly nor Suzie really knew what to say and Phil was busy with his thoughts.

When they arrived home, Dan opened the door to let them in with Nuki yapping around his heels. As the door closed Nuki immediately jumped up at Holly, sniffing the stranger curiously. Holly smiled widely as she bent down to stroke him, letting him lick her fingers.

“Aww, what a cute dog,” she said, grinning. “What’s his name?”

“Nuki,” Suzie told her, also smiling. Holly nodded slowly and continued petting him for a few more moments before standing up and smiling at Dan, whom Phil had just greeted with a kiss.

“Hi,” Holly said, raising her hand slightly in a small wave.

“Hello,” Dan smiled. “Nice to meet you, Holly.”

“You too,” Holly nodded.

There was a brief moment of awkward silence before Dan began walking towards the kitchen. “Well, I’ll go continue with dinner; you girls have got about twenty minutes to do whatever before it’s ready.”

Suzie and Holly both nodded as Phil said, with a subtle playful undertone, “What about me? What do I do for twenty minutes?”

“Editing,” Dan told him shortly, a glint in his eye. “There’s that gaming video that needs finishing, and then you’ve also got your AmazingPhil video haven’t you?”

“Ugh, fine,” Phil muttered in mock-annoyance, walking away towards the office. Dan gave Suzie and Holly an exasperated smile and an eye-roll before heading into the kitchen and leaving the girls in the hallway.

“Um, d’you wanna play Mario Kart?” Suzie asked awkwardly after a couple of seconds of silence. When Holly just looked at her blankly, she added, “I dunno, that’s kinda my go-to when I’ve got friends round.”

Suzie smiled nervously, and she was relieved when Holly grinned and said, “Yeah, sounds great. Sorry, I just zoned out for a second. Er, where should I leave my shoes and bag?” she asked.

“Just there’s fine,” Suzie told her, also removing her own boots before leading Holly through to the lounge and setting up the game. “I have to warn you, I’m pretty good,” Suzie smiled, handing Holly a controller. Holly grinned and sat down on the sofa.

“I’m not too bad myself,” she countered. “I get quite competitive, especially when I play with my family.”

Suzie grinned and sat down next to her as the first race started, and as they continued playing they sank into a concentrated silence, occasionally interrupted by a complaint or celebration about what was happening on-screen.

Holly was indeed ‘not too bad’; in fact, she was very good, one of the only people besides Dan or Phil who had ever presented a decent challenge for Suzie’s title of Mario Kart Champion. By the time Dan called them to dinner, they were about ten races in and practically tied for the number of wins each, Suzie leading by only one.

They paused the game and set down the controllers, then headed into the kitchen where plates of curry and naan were waiting for them.

“Thanks, Da,” Suzie said, sitting down and pouring herself and Holly glasses of Coke.

“Yes, thank you,” Holly agreed, sliding into the seat next to Suzie. “It looks delicious.”

“You’re welcome,” Dan grinned as Phil entered and sat down.

They tucked into the food eagerly, and after a few minutes Phil swallowed his mouthful and said, “So, Holly, tell us a bit about yourself.”

“Um, what kind of things?” Holly asked.

“I’ll tell you something about her,” Suzie put in; “she’s frickin’ _amazing_ at Mario Kart.”

Dan let out a burst of laughter. “At least you’re telling us the important stuff!”

“How good is ‘amazing’?” Phil asked, chuckling.

“I’m really not that great,” Holly said modestly, grinning down at her plate.

“Uh, yeah you are,” Suzie insisted, also grinning. “We just played like, ten races and she managed to win at half of them, and the other half she came second.”

Dan and Phil looked impressed. “That takes some doing, to beat the Mario Kart Champion,” Dan grinned, winking at Suzie.

Suzie grinned shyly. “I mean… yeah,” she admitted after a moment, giggling.

“It wasn’t easy,” Holly laughed, grinning and raising her eyebrows at Suzie.

Suzie blushed and turned her attention back to her food, smiling to herself.

Holly looked back at Phil. “So, what else did you want to know about me?”

“I don’t know, whatever. Do you have any siblings?” Phil prompted.

Holly grinned and raised her eyebrows. “Do I ever; I’m the second of six kids.”

“Six children?!” Dan exclaimed, eyes widening in shock. “Holy shit, I can only just manage one!”

“Thanks, Da,” Suzie said sarcastically, “love you too.”

“You know what I mean,” Dan said, ignoring Phil’s indignant cry of “Dan!” and addressing Holly again, “Seriously, _six kids?_ ”

“Yeah.” Holly was trying not to laugh at Dan’s reaction. “I’ve got an older sister, two younger sisters and two younger brothers.”

“Jesus Christ,” Dan blasphemed, shaking his head and looking back down at his plate.

They continued eating and learning about Holly for another ten minutes before a brief silence fell. Then suddenly, Holly snapped her fingers and pointed at Dan and Phil.

“I’ve got it,” she said. “I was thinking I recognised you two from somewhere. At first I thought it would have been school, when you pick up and drop off Suzie, but you always wait in the car for her, so it couldn’t be that.” As Dan, Phil and Suzie looked slightly surprised by her sudden outburst, Holly continued, “You do YouTube, right? You’re Dan and Phil, _the_ Dan and Phil?”

The other three looked at each other for a moment before Dan said, “Yes, that’s us; Dan and Phil.” He grinned slightly awkwardly, surprised that Holly had only just made the connection.

Holly sat back in her chair, rubbing her hands over her face. “I can’t believe I only just realised that,” she laughed, dropping one hand. “I’m such an idiot! How the eff did I not get that, especially knowing Suzie’s surname? I mean,” she added, once again addressing Dan and Phil, “I don’t watch YouTube that much, and I only really know about you guys because my aunt used to be a big fan of you and she showed me some of your videos.” Holly laughed again, “Ha! Oh my god, my aunt would _shit_ if she knew I was with you right now.”

As she started laughing again the other three joined in, also amused by the fact that it had taken Holly so long to figure it out. Once they had all calmed down, they finished eating and cleared away their plates, then Suzie and Holly went back into the lounge to continue their Mario Kart tournament, arguing playfully about who would win.

As Dan and Phil got started on the washing up, Dan noticed the smirk on his husband’s face and nudged him.

“Hey, I know that face; don’t do anything to interfere,” Dan told him sternly.

“What?” Phil asked, placing a dripping plate on the drying rack.

“You’re plotting ways to get them together,” Dan said, picking up the plate and starting to dry it. “Don’t – let Suzie work it out on her own.”

“How do you know me so well?” Phil asked, smiling cheekily as he began cleaning the next plate.

“We’ve been married for seventeen years, Phil,” Dan reminded him fondly. “Longer if you ask a lot of our fans. Do you remember when your mum was trying to act matchmaker for us?”

“Yeah, that was annoying.”

“Exactly.” Dan put the plate he was drying away in the cupboard and picked up the next one. “Neither of us appreciated it, so Suzie probably won’t either.”

Phil nodded, rinsing the bubbles off a handful of cutlery. “Yeah, you’re right,” he admitted. “I won’t do anything, I promise.”

“Good,” Dan grinned, and they talked about other things while the pile of dirty dishes quickly shrank.

When they were done, they went through to the lounge. Suzie and Holly were in the middle of a race, and Holly had just hit Suzie with a blue shell, allowing her to take the lead.

“Ha!” Holly laughed as she sped past.

“No! Goddammit, that’s not fair!” Suzie complained, glancing over her shoulder as she heard Dan and Phil enter. “Hi, dads.”

“Hello,” Phil smiled, taking a seat in one of the armchairs as Dan flopped down in the other. “We just came to witness Holly’s legendary driving for ourselves.”

Holly smirked as she drifted round a corner, throwing a couple of banana peels over her shoulder as she did so. Suzie just barely managed to avoid the bananas, and by hitting a mystery box and getting a golden mushroom she was able to catch back up.

They were almost neck and neck as they turned onto the final stretch, Suzie only a second behind, but then Holly suddenly spun around and fired a red shell before spinning back to face forwards, hitting Suzie and meaning that she crossed the finish line unchallenged.

“Yes!” Holly cheered, raising her arms in triumph.

Suzie put her controller down and pointed an accusing finger at Holly. “Hacker! How the hell did you do that?!”

Holly just grinned knowingly, her face smug as she looked over at Dan and Phil. “How’s that?” she asked. Dan and Phil just nodded, their expressions surprised and impressed. Holly looked back at Suzie. “No hacking,” she promised, still grinning, “just good driving.”

Suzie still looked sceptical, but there was a glint of amusement in her eyes that showed she wasn’t serious.

*

They continued playing for about thirty more minutes before they’d had enough, and by that point Holly was ahead by three wins.

Phil had drifted off to continue with his editing, and Dan had briefly left to get his laptop and was now back in the lounge scrolling through his Twitter feed. Suzie turned off the console and pulled out her phone.

“What’s your number?” she asked Holly. Holly grinned and told her, pulling out her own phone and waiting as Suzie finished creating the contact. Suzie smiled to herself as she typed out a quick message to send to Holly so that the other girl had her number. Holly glanced down as her phone buzzed and chuckled as she read the message.

“‘Hello im a rat’? Is that from you?” she laughed.

“Yep,” Suzie grinned.

“That’s my girl,” Dan said, grinning as he glanced at them over the top of his laptop.

“Exactly,” Suzie said proudly as Holly added her contact. “Da and Pa are both rats, so that automatically makes me one.”

As Holly finished creating Suzie’s contact, her phone buzzed again and she opened the notification to see a text from her mum.

“What’s your address?” she asked Suzie. “My mum wants to know so she can come pick me up.”

“Are you sure you don’t want us to drop you back?” Dan offered, once again looking past his laptop.

“Uh, I’ll ask,” Holly said, relaying the offer to her mum. She received a reply almost immediately. “Um, yeah, that’d be great, if you don’t mind,” she asked, looking at Dan.

“No, that’s fine,” Dan insisted. “Does she want you back now?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Alright.” Dan closed his laptop and stood up. “I’ll go tell Pa that’s what we’re doing, you two go get ready.”

Dan left, and Holly and Suzie followed him out of the room and went to the front door where they’d left their shoes.

“Phil?” Dan called gently as he entered the office. Phil turned around from where he was working at the computer.

“Yeah?”

“Me and Suzie are gonna take Holly home. You alright here?”

“Yeah fine.” Phil tilted his head back to meet Dan’s lips as the younger man kissed him. “See you in a bit.”

“Bye.”

Dan headed back out to the hall where Suzie and Holly were waiting, slipping his shoes on and grabbing his keys as Phil yelled from the office, “Bye, Holly! It was nice to meet you!”

“Nice to meet you too!” Holly called back, grinning as Suzie facepalmed. Dan opened the front door and the two girls followed him out to the car and climbed into the backseat.

“Where do you live, Holly?” Dan asked, turning on the sat-nav. Holly told him her address and Dan typed it in, pulling out of the driveway once the route had come up.

They didn’t talk much on the way to Holly’s. When they got there, Dan pulled up to the pavement and paused to let Holly out.

“Well, it was nice meeting you, Holly,” he said, grinning as she opened the door and climbed out.

“You too. Thank you for having me,” Holly said as Suzie got out as well.

“You’re welcome.”

Suzie walked round to the passenger side, grinning at Holly as they faced each other at the back of the car. “Bye,” she said. “Thanks for coming.”

“I had fun,” Holly smiled, and after a moment she held out her arms to Suzie.

Suzie blushed and smiled shyly, raising her own arms and hugging Holly. Dan glanced in the rear-view mirror and smiled to himself, watching as Holly hugged Suzie firmly for a few seconds, and then they drew apart, grinning at each other.

“We should hang out again sometime,” Holly said, hitching her rucksack higher on her shoulder.

“Yeah,” Suzie agreed, slightly breathlessly.

Holly gave her one last grin before heading past her towards her house. Suzie continued round to the passenger door, climbing in next to Dan and fastening her seatbelt as she watched Holly waiting on the doorstep. After a moment, the door opened, spilling yellow light across the black path and silhouetting a thin figure with wavy hair. As Holly entered the brightly lit house, Holly’s mum waved to Dan and Suzie in the car, calling a quick ‘thank you’ before following her daughter inside. Dan and Suzie waved back, and then drove away as the door shut behind Holly and her mum.

Suzie stared ahead into the shadows beyond the headlamps, looking up as Dan smiled sideways at her.

“Well,” he said encouragingly, “you’re one step closer to telling her the real reason you invited her round.”


	9. Chapter 9

Suzie closed her locker, nudging Taylor playfully as he finished questioning her about what had happened with Holly. He had been jokingly disappointed when Suzie told him the only thing they had done was play Mario Kart, but had also found it hilarious that it had taken Holly so long to realise who Dan and Phil were.

They headed down the corridor, chatting about what Suzie was going to do next about progressing her relationship with Holly when they heard someone calling Suzie’s name. They turned around to see none other than Holly herself jogging down the corridor towards them, her group of friends waiting for her in the background.

“Hey, Holly,” Suzie called, blushing slightly. “Everything alright?”

“Yeah, fine,” Holly panted, stopping next to them. “Hi, Taylor.”

“Hi,” Taylor smiled.

Holly turned back to Suzie. “Um, I was wondering if you wanted to meet up at the weekend?” _Was it Suzie’s imagination, or was Holly blushing as well?_

“Uh, yeah,” Suzie said after a moment. “Yeah, that’d be great.”

“Ok, cool.” Holly glanced up as the bell rang. “I’ll, um, talk to you at lunch, yeah?”

“Yeah, ok,” Suzie grinned. Holly grinned back before jogging away down the corridor to re-join her friends.

Suzie glanced at Taylor, who smirked and raised his eyebrows at her. Suzie punched him lightly in the shoulder and rolled her eyes, walking off to class.

*

As promised, Holly came over to sit with them at lunch. She had originally just intended to talk to Suzie and then go back to her friends, but as she had her lunch tray with her Suzie offered for her to sit and eat with them. Holly had thanked her with a grin and sat down next to her. Throughout the whole conversation, Suzie was intensely aware of how close they were.

In the end, they arranged to go to the cinema on Saturday afternoon. Once that was sorted, they chatted about random other things while they finished their lunches, then Holly went back to her friends, giving Suzie a grin and a ‘see you later’ as she left.

Once she had gone, Taylor gave Suzie a wink and a thumbs-up, and then shrugged, grinning, as she kicked him playfully under the table.

*

The next morning, Suzie woke up feeling excited. The clock on her phone read about half past seven, so she opened her laptop and spent about an hour and a half browsing through various social medias and watching videos on YouTube before she felt it was time to get up. She picked up her phone and headed downstairs, stepping carefully over the sleeping Nuki as she crossed the landing.

Suzie made her way into the kitchen, and as she was pouring herself a bowl of cereal light footsteps on the stairs alerted her to the fact that she wasn’t the only one awake. A moment later, Nuki’s face appeared in the doorway, looking at her with his ears pricked.

“Hello, Nuki,” Suzie smiled, and the dog trotted over to her, tail wagging. Suzie gave him fusses for a minute, then stood up and refilled his water bowl before taking her breakfast over to the table. She watched YouTube on her phone as she ate, and after about fifteen minutes Dan came downstairs.

“Morning, sweetie,” he yawned. “You’re up early,” he added, crossing the kitchen and picking up the kettle.

“It’s twenty past nine, Da,” Suzie told him.

“Exactly! It’s before ten o’clock on a Saturday! And you call yourself our daughter,” Dan joked, bringing the kettle over to the sink and starting to fill it with water. “Do you want tea or coffee?”

“I was getting bored of lying in bed,” Suzie explained defensively, rolling her eyes. “And tea, please.”

Dan flicked the kettle on and began pulling mugs out of the cupboard. “What time are you meeting Holly?” he asked; Suzie had told them about it over dinner last night.

“Two o’clock,” Suzie answered, swallowing her last mouthful of cereal and taking her empty bowl over to the sink.

Dan nodded. “So you’ve got plenty of time beforehand.” When the kettle was done, he poured boiling water into the mugs and let them infuse before adding the respective milk and sugar to each. Then, leaving Suzie’s on the counter for her, Dan took his and Phil’s back upstairs, Nuki at his heels.

After a moment, Suzie followed, carrying her tea up to her room and spending another hour on the internet while she drank it.

Once she had finished, Suzie headed into the bathroom and showered thoroughly. Then, she went back to her bedroom and stood in front of her open wardrobe with her towel still wrapped around her, pondering what to wear.

Her normal look was just a T-shirt, black skinny jeans and a leather jacket, but today Suzie wanted to make a bit of an effort. Obviously, this wasn’t a ‘date’; they were just two friends meeting up, so she didn’t want to look overly smart, just to wear something a bit nicer than her usual everyday clothes.

In the end, Suzie picked out a light-weight, white blouse and some black leggings. They were smart enough to show that she was making more of an effort than she normally would for school, but subtle enough that Holly shouldn’t think she was expecting anything.

For the next couple of hours until it was time for her to leave to meet Holly, Suzie scrolled absently through Tumblr and YouTube, not really paying attention to what she was looking at, her thoughts on the upcoming outing.

At about twenty past one, Suzie turned off her laptop and headed downstairs, grabbing her handbag with her phone, keys, Oyster card and purse packed inside. She opted to wear her black converse high-tops, and once she had tied the laces she stuck her head into the office where Dan and Phil were filming a gaming video.

“Hey, dads; I’m off,” she told them, having waited for them to pause what they were doing.

“Ok, we’ll see you later,” Dan smiled. “Have fun.”

“Text us when you’re on your way back,” Phil added, also grinning.

“Will do. Bye!”

“Bye, sweetie.”

*

Suzie caught the Tube to the cinema where she had arranged to meet Holly. It was relatively empty, as it was midday on a Saturday, so Suzie had no trouble getting a seat. She had her earphones in, and it was only a few stops, so the journey passed fairly quickly. She got there a few minutes early, so while she waited for Holly she browsed through what films were on.

Holly arrived about ten minutes later, wearing her usual black T-shirt, ripped skinny jeans and leather jacket. “Hi,” she called as she approached, grinning at Suzie.

“Hey,” Suzie smiled. “You alright?”

“Yeah, good thanks. You?”

“Fine.” A few moments of awkward silence passed before Suzie said, “Shall we go in?”

Holly nodded and followed her inside. They bought their tickets and popcorn, and then headed into the screening room for their movie. The theatre was fairly empty, so they slipped into a couple of seats halfway along the middle row. For a few minutes they just looked at their phones, unsure what to say to each other, then Suzie felt a nudge from her right.

“Suzie.”

She looked up to see Holly holding up her phone to take a selfie. Suzie just about managed to mould her face into a suitable expression before Holly took the picture and brought her arm down to inspect it. Suzie looked over her shoulder, and was surprised to see that it actually looked pretty good. Holly glanced at her to see her reaction, and Suzie nodded.

“That’s nice,” she said, smiling at Holly. Holly grinned back, putting her phone back in her pocket as the lights dimmed.

They fell silent as the film started up, steadily munching their way through their popcorn. It was a good movie, Suzie thought; a bit cliché, but still with a compelling plot. Once the lights came back up, they made their way out with the rest of the crowd, pausing to put their empty popcorn cups in the recycling bin as they went. They stood chatting about the film for a couple of minutes, then Holly suggested they go get something to eat.

“I dunno about you, but I’m starving,” she grinned. “That popcorn was the only thing I’ve eaten today.”

Suzie agreed that she was also feeling a bit hungry, so they headed to a small café near the Thames. They ordered paninis and took them to a table by the window. They continued discussing the movie as they ate, arguing playfully about their favourite characters and scenes, and when they had finished Holly offered to buy them both ice creams. Suzie thanked her, blushing, and they went to sit on a bench beside the river to eat them.

They mainly sat in silence while they ate their ice creams, but this silence felt a lot less awkward than many of the previous ones had. Suzie finished her cone, turning to smile at Holly and thank her again, but Holly frowned at her lips.

“You’ve got a bit…” Holly reached over and wiped her thumb over the corner of Suzie’s mouth. Suzie blinked in surprise, and Holly retracted her hand hurriedly. “Uh, sorry.”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Suzie assured her, trying to calm her speeding heartrate. Holly grinned sheepishly, and Suzie smiled back.

Soon after that, they decided to head home. They parted with a hug and a ‘see you on Monday’, and once Suzie had texted Phil to let him know she was on her way she sat with her fingers brushing the spot Holly had touched, swaying slightly with the motion of the train.

*

When Suzie got home, Dan and Phil were sitting on the sofa in the lounge watching TV.

“Hello,” she called, closing the door behind her.

“Hi, sweetie,” Dan said, smiling at Suzie as she came into the lounge.

“Did you have a good time?” Phil asked.

“Yeah, it was fun,” Suzie told them, bending down to stroke Nuki, who was asleep on the floor next to the coffee table. “We watched the movie, then went out to get some lunch and got ice creams to eat by the river.”

Dan and Phil grinned at her as she stood up again and headed up to her room.

As she dropped her bag on her bed, her phone buzzed, and she pulled it out to see an Instagram notification: ‘ _hjordn has requested to follow you_ ’. Suzie’s heart was racing as she confirmed Holly’s follow request and instantly clicked ‘follow back’, ignoring the handful of other requests from unknown people, although from their phan-account-based usernames she could make a pretty accurate guess about why they wanted to follow her.

Despite (or perhaps because of) who her dads were, Suzie chose to have her Instagram private so that only her friends and other people she knew could follow her. A small but nevertheless significant number of Dan and Phil’s more ‘demon’ fans had been annoyed at that, being the kind of people who believed they had a ‘right’ to know what was happening in Dan, Phil and Suzie’s lives, but after the hate they had received from the rest of the Phandom Dan and Phil had publicly announced that it was Suzie’s choice if she wanted to have a private account, and anyone who bothered her about it would be blocked and reported.

Suzie got changed into some more slobby clothes, and a few minutes later she got another notification: ‘ _hjordn tagged you in a post_ ’. Holly had posted the selfie of them at the cinema, captioned; “Day out with @suzie_h.l” followed by various movie and food emojis. Suzie ‘liked’ it and commented a couple of hearts and smiley faces, only worrying if that was too obvious after she had already posted it. Suzie hesitated for a moment, wondering if she should delete it, but then decided to leave it. _Loads of people say things like that platonically._

Later that evening, Suzie was lying in bed, her room lit up with the blue glow of her laptop screen, when a loud buzz made her jump. Suzie picked up her phone from her bedside cabinet, her breath catching when she saw that it was an Instagram DM from Holly:

_Hey, I hope you don’t mind me posting that picture_

Suzie smiled; _No it’s fine. It’s a nice photo_

Holly sent back a smiley face, followed by; _I’m glad you like it. Do you want me to send it to you?_

_Yes please_

She waited, and a moment later the photo popped up in the conversation. Suzie smiled as she saved it to her phone, then sent Holly a quick _Thx_. She paused for a second then quickly sent another message: _I like spending time with you_.

Suzie watched anxiously as the little ‘seen’ icon popped up, and then the ‘typing’ one. For several agonising seconds, Holly kept typing; then she seemed to change her mind, and the icon disappeared for a moment before reappearing.

_I like spending time with you too. We should definitely hang out more :)_

_Yeah, we should :)_

It took a couple of minutes for Holly to text back: _Listen I gtg but ill c u on Monday_

_Ok bye_

_Bye x_

Suzie blinked, staring at that one small ‘x’ on the screen. _What did that mean? Did Holly like her back, or did she just mean it platonically?_

Either way, when Suzie went to sleep soon after, there was a small smile on her face.


	10. Chapter 10

On Monday morning the Sun rose, but in Suzie’s mind everything remained dark. It was one of _those_ days: days when there was no point to doing anything; when she just wanted to stop existing and float forever in a void of nothing.

Suzie didn’t respond when Dan called for her to get up and start getting ready for school. She didn’t respond when he called again, louder, a few minutes later. She didn’t even respond when he knocked on her bedroom door.

“Suzie, wake up,” Dan said, his voice tinted with annoyance as he stuck his head in. Suzie was lying on her side, facing away from the door, so Dan went in and stood by the bed. “Suzie, c’mon,” he told her more forcefully.

Still nothing.

Now slightly concerned, Dan moved round the other side of the bed so that he was standing in front of her. Suzie’s eyes were open, staring blankly at the wall. As Dan came into her line of sight, she glanced up at him, catching his eye for a moment before looking back down.

Dan sighed: he recognised these signs; had spent enough days of his own lying in bed feeling like his world was empty of any kind of joy or reason to do anything.

Suzie didn’t move as he left the room. Dan left the door ajar as he went downstairs and padded into the kitchen where Phil was making breakfast. The older man glanced over as Dan crossed to get a glass out of the cupboard.

“Is she up?” he asked, turning back to the toaster.

“No,” Dan sighed, moving to the sink and filling the glass with water.

“What? She’d better get a move on, otherwise she’s gonna be late for school.”

“She’s not going to school today.”

Phil looked over, surprised, to meet his husband’s gaze as Dan turned around and leaned back against the sink, the glass of water in one hand. “What’s happened?”

Dan sighed. “Y’know those days when my depression takes over and I just want to spend the rest of my life lying in bed not doing anything?”

“Yeah?” Phil prompted, his voice filled with concern for what he guessed was coming.

“I think she’s having one of those days.” Phil sighed sadly, his fears confirmed. Dan indicated the glass of water in his hand; “I’m gonna take this to her. Can you call the school to let them know she won’t be in?”

“Yeah, of course.”

Dan headed back upstairs. Phil pulled his phone out of his pocket and scrolled down to the school’s contact, sighing again as he put the phone to his ear.

Suzie still hadn’t moved when Dan returned. His footsteps creaked on the wooden floor as he crossed over to sit on the edge of the bed away from Suzie, setting the glass on her bedside cabinet with a tap that echoed unnaturally loudly in the deadened air.

Suzie turned her head slightly to look at Dan out of the corner of her eye. He was scanning the posters and photos above her bed, not meeting her gaze, for which she was thankful as she returned to staring at the wall.

“Pa’s calling school to say you won’t be in today,” Dan told her, breaking the silence after a moment. “You just take as long as you need to get back to where you need to be.”

A couple of seconds passed. Dan was about to get up and leave Suzie in peace, but then a small voice from under the covers stopped him.

“Thank you,” Suzie murmured, slightly hoarsely. Dan smiled, resting a comforting hand on her leg.

“You’re welcome, sweetie.” He paused, then continued; “I’m so sorry it’s taken us too long to notice.”

“I meant to tell you,” Suzie whispered, her voice catching briefly.

“Don’t worry, Suzie,” Dan said. “We know now, and that means we can help you.” He stood up and leaned over to kiss her gently on the forehead. “I’ll leave you to try and get some more sleep. If you need anything, just call us; text us, even. I know you might not feel like it,” he added, beginning to walk towards the door, “but try and drink that water – it’s the little things that I find help most.”

He pulled the door to behind him, and Suzie was once again alone with her thoughts. For several hours after that, she drifted in and out of restless sleep, waking only to stare at the wall again before falling back under. At one point, Nuki nosed his way in and settled on the bed next to her, letting her draw comfort from his presence.

By midday, the glass was only half-full.

*

A couple of days later, Suzie’s mental cloud had mostly cleared. Even if it hadn’t totally gone, it had at least faded back to the edges of her mind, allowing the Sun to shine through again.

Lying in bed, Suzie became aware of how gross she felt from lying in bed for almost two days straight: her pyjama top was sticking to her with dried sweat, twisted uncomfortably around her because she hadn’t been bothered to straighten it after tossing and turning in her sleep; her hair was greasy and tangled, and her eyes were sticky and circled in thick purple-grey.

Dan was just coming out of his and Phil’s bedroom when the sound of the door across the landing made him look up. Suzie was standing there with her towel and a bundle of clothes, and when she noticed Dan looking at her she gave him a small smile before continuing into the bathroom. Dan smiled back as the door closed behind her, and he waited a few moments to hear the sound of the shower before heading downstairs.

Phil smiled when Dan told him; he knew from experience with Dan’s bad days how difficult it could be to muster up enough motivation to perform even the most basic forms of self-care, and he was happy to hear of this sign that their daughter was feeling better.

A little while later, Dan and Phil were playing a casual game of Mario Kart when they heard footsteps on the stairs, and they both glanced over at the lounge door as Suzie entered wearing an oversized hoodie and a pair of trackeys, her damp hair dripping slightly as she crossed the room and settled in one of the armchairs with her feet tucked underneath her.

“How’re you feeling, sweetie?” Phil asked, pausing the race and lowering his controller.

Suzie nodded minutely. “Better,” she murmured, her voice hoarse from lack of use.

Dan gave her a small grin, setting down his own controller. “Some fresh air might help,” he suggested gently. “Shall we go take Nuki for a walk?”

At the mention of his name and the ‘w’ word, Nuki perked up from where he had been lying on the rug, and Suzie couldn’t help but smile as the dog’s tail began to thump steadily against the sofa, his big brown eyes flitting between her, Dan and Phil.

They took him to the park and let him off the lead, standing to watch him scamper off in pursuit of smells for a moment before beginning to walk around the edge of the field. Suzie walked in the middle, her hands in the kangaroo pocket of her hoodie and her head down, watching her feet in silence. Dan and Phil took up position either side of her, occasionally making eye contact over her bowed head.

After a while, Suzie spoke, her voice quiet and her tone blank; “I was going to tell you.”

Dan and Phil looked at each other, but before they could reply Suzie spoke again;

“I wanted to tell you, but I didn’t want you to worry.”

“Suzie…”

“I didn’t want to make any more trouble for you,” she continued, raising her voice slightly to speak over Dan. Now that she had started, she seemed desperate to continue, to explain. “You both already have so much to deal with; I didn’t want to add to your problems.”

Tears pricked her eyes as Phil put one hand on her shoulder and moved round in front of her, gently forcing her to stop walking. “Suzie, listen to me,” he told her, calmly but insistently, “you mustn’t think like that. You are our top priority, ok? We love you no matter what, and we always will; if you’re struggling, we will do everything we can to help you.”

For a few moments, Suzie kept her eyes on the grass, not meeting her dads’ gaze. Then she looked up and smiled at them, taking her hands out of her pocket and holding her arms out. Dan and Phil grinned back, stepping closer and pulling her into a group hug. Suzie being only five foot six, they completely swamped her, but at that moment that was what she needed: to feel like a little girl again, safely wrapped in the protection of her fathers’ arms.


	11. Chapter 11

Suzie went back to school on Thursday. As she was getting her books out of her locker she felt a hand on her shoulder, and she turned around to see Taylor standing behind her.

“Hey,” he said, smiling. “You alright?”

“Yeah,” Suzie told him, nodding and giving him a small smile. “Just had a couple of bad days.”

Taylor nodded understandingly; he’d guessed that’s what it was when none of his messages had been replied to. “I’m guessing that means your dads know now?”

“Yeah.” Suzie closed her locker, and they began walking up to their form room.

“Holly was asking after you, by the way,” Taylor added as they climbed the stairs.

“Really? What did you tell her?”

Taylor shrugged. “I just said that you weren’t feeling well.”

Suzie nodded absently. When she felt depressed, she tended to just delete the notification without looking at it, so if Holly had messaged her she wouldn’t have read it. She hoped her chances with Holly hadn’t been ruined so early on.

*

At lunchtime, Suzie and Taylor sat at their usual table. They didn’t talk much while they ate, but as they were taking their trays over to the racks Suzie heard someone call her name, and turned around to see Holly walking towards her.

“Hey, Holly,” she said, smiling.

“Hi.” Holly stopped next to her. “Uh, are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine, thanks,” Suzie told her.

“Ok,” Holly nodded. “Um, listen,” she continued after a pause, rubbing the back of her neck nervously, “I was just kinda wondering if… maybe I’d done something wrong? Because you weren’t answering my messages, and…”

“No, no,” Suzie assured her, interrupting; “it wasn’t your fault. I just had an off couple of days; it happens every so often.”

Holly looked relieved. “Ok, good. I was worried.”

Suzie grinned. “Hey, um, do you want to do something again this weekend?” she asked.

“Yeah, that’d be nice,” Holly agreed. “What sort of thing?”

“Er… what about a sleepover?” Suzie suggested, suddenly feeling bold. “We could watch movies and stuff?”

“Yeah, ok.” Holly grinned widely. “Can we have it at yours? My house gets pretty hectic with all my brothers and sisters.”

“Fine,” Suzie smiled. “What about tomorrow night? You could come straight to mine after school.”

“Ok, sounds good,” Holly gave Suzie a nod and a grin before she headed back to the table where her friends were eating. Suzie looked at Taylor, who had been hovering behind her during the conversation. He grinned and raised his eyebrows at her before turning and leading her out of the canteen, and Suzie paused just long enough to roll her eyes at him before following.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a bit of a shorter filler chapter, but a lot more happens in the next one :)


	12. Chapter 12

At half past three on Friday, Suzie headed down to the lockers to put her books away. As she was closing the door, she looked up the corridor and caught a glimpse through the crowd of Holly standing at her own locker. Suzie hitched up her bag and made her way towards Holly, who glanced up when she was about two metres away.

“Hey,” Holly grinned, pulling a canvas bag out of her locker and replacing it with a pile of books. “You ready to go?”

“Yeah, are you?” Suzie asked, also smiling.

“Pretty much.” Holly shut the door and picked up her rucksack, swinging it onto her shoulder with the canvas bag in her other hand. “Alright, let’s go.”

They headed out to the gate and down the road a little way to where Phil was waiting in the car. Suzie climbed in the back with Holly and greetings of “Hey, Pa” and “Hi, Mr Lester”, and as Phil drove away Holly turned to Suzie.

“I didn’t need to bring a sleeping bag, did I?”

“No,” Suzie assured her. “I’ve got a sofa bed in my room, and we’ve got spare bedding.”

“Ok, good,” Holly grinned.

They didn’t talk much for the rest of the way, and once they got home the girls headed straight up to Suzie’s room, calling greetings to Dan.

Phil went through to the lounge, where Dan was sitting on the sofa with his laptop doing a liveshow. He paused to return Suzie and Holly’s ‘hello’s and to give Phil a quick kiss as the older man came in to grab his laptop before leaving again, heading through to the office so that he wouldn’t disturb Dan.

Suzie and Holly dumped their bags on the floor by Suzie’s bed, then Suzie crossed over to the sofa and began picking up the cushions and tossing them over onto the bed. Once the sofa was clear, Holly helped her pull it out into bed-mode, then Suzie went to get bedding for her.

“Da! Where’s the spare duvet and sheets?!” she yelled, leaning over the banister at the top of the stairs.

A second of silence passed, and then Dan yelled back, “Ask Pa; I’m doing a liveshow!”

“Pa! Where’s the spare duvet and sheets?!”

Holly laughed as Phil called, “They’re in the store cupboard!”

Suzie crossed the landing to the cupboard and opened the door. It wasn’t very well organised (at all; everything was basically just piled in), but she was able to extricate the duvet, a cover for it and a sheet to cover the mattress. With her arms full, Suzie kicked the door closed and headed back to her room.

Holly was sitting on Suzie’s bed with her phone out, but when Suzie returned and dumped her burden on the floor Holly put her phone away and came over to help.

Fifteen minutes later, the bed was set up. Suzie gave Holly the Wi-Fi, and then they just sat and chatted for a little while about random topics. Soon after, Phil came upstairs and stuck his head into Suzie’s room to suggest that they ordered pizza so that the girls could eat it upstairs. Once he had taken their requests, Phil went back downstairs and asked Dan (who was still doing his liveshow) what he wanted before calling the pizza place to order.

Suzie pulled up Netflix on her laptop and asked Holly to pick a movie for them to watch. Holly chose a sci-fi thriller, so Suzie set it up in preparation.

The pizza arrived about twenty minutes later, and Phil brought the boxes into the lounge and put them on the coffee table, calling Suzie and Holly to come and get theirs.

Dan was just finishing his liveshow, and as the girls came into the lounge he said, “Phil, Suzie; d’you wanna say something to everyone before we go?”

“No,” Suzie said jokily, moving to pick out a piece of pizza as Phil sat down next to Dan and began saying hello to people.

“Come on, Suzie,” he insisted with a smile.

Suzie rolled her eyes at Holly in mock-annoyance, then went to sit on Dan’s other side. “Hi, chat. We got pizza,” she said, showing her slice and slowly moving it closer to the camera so that it filled up the screen.

“Don’t get cheese on the webcam, Suzie,” Dan told her, and Suzie moved it away to take a bite.

“Yeah, your laptop’s dirty enough as it is,” she said with her mouth full. “Don’t you ever clean it?”

“Yes, actually,” Dan said indignantly as Phil laughed.

“She’s got a point, though, Dan,” the older man added, grinning.

“See? Pa agrees,” Suzie said sassily, taking another bite and pointing the pizza at the screen. “I mean, look at that image – we look so gross through this camera.” To illustrate her point, Suzie leaned in closer so that her face filled up most of the screen. “It’s so grainy. I can actually see fingerprints on the lens, that’s probably why.”

“Alright, alright,” Dan insisted, pushing her away and trying to hide his smile. “You’ve said hello, made your point: you can go now.”

“Ok. Bye, everyone!” Suzie waved her pizza at the camera, then stood up and crossed over to Holly as Dan and Phil said their goodbyes and ended the stream.

Holly had been standing on the opposite side of the room while they finished the liveshow, a small smile on her face as she watched Suzie interacting with her dads and their fans.

“Sorry about that,” Suzie said as she came over.

Holly shook her head. “No, it’s fine.”

Suzie grinned. Then, as a moment of silence passed, she added, “Shall we go upstairs?”

“Yep; let’s go.” Holly smiled as she picked up her pizza and followed Suzie. “I was just thinking how cute you three look as a family.”

Suzie smiled shyly. “Thanks.”

Back in the lounge, Dan and Phil heard Holly’s comment, and they grinned at each other as they settled down with their own pizzas and movie, cuddling together happily.


	13. Chapter 13

The pizzas had been eaten and the empty boxes taken downstairs; the movie was finished, and the house was for the most part silent. Dan and Phil had said goodnight and gone to bed, leaving Suzie and Holly to sort themselves out.

Now, the girls were lying in their separate beds, the room lit up by the bedside lamp and the blue light from their phones, Nuki asleep beside Suzie’s feet. They were doing their separate things on their various social medias, not talking to each other, but after a while Holly spoke.

“Suzie?”

“Hm?” Suzie replied, still looking at her phone.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Yeah, sure.”

Holly paused before continuing, and Suzie heard her sigh slightly. A couple of seconds later, Holly asked, “Do you have a crush on me?”

Suzie’s heartrate suddenly jumped to a sprint; her palms became sweaty and her breathing caught as she tried to calm herself down from the shock of the unexpected question. “W-why d’you think that?” she asked casually once she had managed to get her breathing somewhat under control.

Holly shrugged. “We’d never really talked before, so when you asked to hang out it kinda seemed to come out of nowhere, y’know what I mean? And you seemed really nervous around me, especially at first, and… I dunno, I just wondered…”

Holly trailed off, and Suzie waited anxiously for her to continue. When she didn’t, Suzie murmured nervously, “Yeah. I do.”

Holly lowered her phone. “You _do_ have a crush on me?”

“Yeah.” Suzie put her own phone down and looked over at Holly, her whole body tense as she waited for the reaction.

“Huh.” Holly was staring up at the ceiling, her expression difficult to read in the dim light.

“What?” Suzie asked worriedly.

Holly turned to meet Suzie’s gaze and pushed herself up on one elbow so that she was facing the other girl. “I think I kinda have a crush on you, too.”

Suzie’s breath caught, and a small smile began to pull at her lips. “R-really?”

“Yeah.” Holly smiled. “I mean, you’re pretty, clever, strong –”

“I’m really not,” Suzie muttered, blushing. “Like, look at you: you’re so insanely hot, and you don’t give a fuck about what people think of you.”

Holly grinned. “Thanks.”

They were both silent for a moment, and then Suzie asked, “Holly?”

“Yeah?”

“Can…” Suzie gulped, “c-can I… can I kiss you?”

Holly grinned wider. “Y-yeah, sure.”

Suzie climbed out of bed and crossed the room, licking her lips nervously as she sat down tentatively on the edge of Holly’s mattress. Holly sat up and swung her legs off the bed so that she was sitting next to Suzie, and for a moment the two girls just looked into each other’s eyes, smiling nervously.

Slowly, Suzie leaned in, her eyes flicking down to Holly’s mouth before fluttering shut. Holly copied her, moving closer until their lips touched.

Suzie had never kissed anyone before, but instantly she knew this was better. The ring in Holly’s lower lip was a surprise contrast to her soft, warm lips, but it also felt right, like it was meant to be there.

They broke apart after a few seconds, but they remained close; their foreheads pressed together, their eyes shining, and a wide smile on both faces. They were both breathing slightly faster than usual, and once a few moments had passed Suzie spoke.

“Does this make us girlfriends?” she asked, her voice an apprehensive whisper.

“Yeah,” Holly answered softly. “Yeah, I think it does – if that’s what you want?”

Suzie nodded, her hair falling over her face like a curtain. “Yes.”

Holly grinned. “Ok.”

They pulled apart a couple of seconds later as Suzie turned away to yawn, covering her mouth with her hand to stifle it.

“Oh, sorry,” she murmured, smiling. “I think we should get some sleep now.”

“Yeah, I agree,” Holly said, hiding her own yawn and reaching for her phone. “It _is_ almost half twelve.”

Suzie nodded and grinned. “Goodnight, then, Holly.”

Holly grinned back. “Goodnight, Suzie.”

Suzie stood up and crossed back to her own bed, climbing in and giving Holly one last smile before she turned the lamp off. Holly settled herself back down, returning Suzie’s smile as the light went out, leaving the girls in darkness with smiles on their faces that neither could see but both knew were there.


	14. Update

Hi guys!

Sorry I haven't updated this fic in a while - I kinda lost the spark for it and didn't know where I wanted the story to go, and I still don't.

However, I would still like to come back to this fic at some point, as I really like the concept and am happy with how it's gone so far, but it probably wouldn't be for a while.

I know how frustrating it is for a story you like to be stopped partway through, and I'm sorry for that, but if y'all are patient with me I probably will continue it at some point in the future, I just don't know when.

In the meantime, if you like my writing, I am currently writing a werewolf/soulmate au Phanfiction called 'Silver Heart', which I think some of you will enjoy :)

Again, thanks for understanding, and please let me know if you would like me to continue this fic :)

-Ky <3

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!  
> Let me know your thoughts on Tumblr @ky-thewolf


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